The Good:
Tom Cruise continues to be the most reliably entertaining action star working today (and my personal favorite A-List movie star to boot) and continues his streak of really good action films over the past couple of years. He brings a bit more comedy to the role of Ethan Hunt in this film which is probably a result of Christopher McQuarrie’s script/direction and his sharing so many scenes with the always hilarious Simon Pegg.
Speaking of McQuarrie, he brings a lighter tone to a good portion of this film while also keeping the action very tight and thrilling. His use of the IMF team is really good too and I found myself really liking the chemistry between Ving Rhames and Jeremy Renner.
I also was blown away by Rebecca Ferguson as British spy Ilsa Faust (that name is so friggin’ awesome too!) and would love to see her spun off into her own film. I never knew Ferguson had this kick butt action hero in her since my only experience with her is from the TV show THE WHITE QUEEN.
And, like always, the action scenes in this movie continues the tradition of truly amazing Mission Impossible action set pieces. This film sets the bar pretty high with the imagination and just flat out fun nature of these scenes.

The Bad:
As thrilling as all of the action set pieces were in this movie they were wrapped around a pretty ho-hum story with very little complexity to it.

The Ugly:
As big of a fan as I am for this franchise and this movie in particular, ROGUE NATION suffers from the same failing that the majority of the MI films have and that is namely that the villain is pretty forgettable. And as much as Sean Harris’ Solomon Lane looked the part of an intriguing bad guy, at the end of the day he was just really blah.

Final Verdict: A fun and funny action hit that acquits itself well in relation to the rest of the films in this top flight franchise. While not a feast for the eyes like the previous film, GHOST PROTOCOL, this film does ratchet up the team aspect and introduces a great femme fatale that I would love to see more of. Bring on the next mission, folks!